This Mortal Coil
by Werewriter.Werescientist
Summary: "Haven't you ever had something you just couldn't quite explain to anyone? Even if they hunted monsters, and you were already known to be one? Perhaps that is just what happens after questioning one's sanity for so long."-Nikola Tesla  Rated T for now
1. Prologue

**AN**: _For anyone who followed "The Scientist's Protege" I am abandoning that ff (I know! I'm sorry I just completely forgot where I had been going with it!), and intending This Mortal Coil to be a reboot of that basic idea, albeit a little more developed. I own nothing here except for the OC and her profession. And if anyone is wondering why Nikola seems a bit insane, he's really not, I just saw an opportunity and exploited it, :K. Please R&R. I REALLY WILL update this time! And feed back-of almost any kind-is much loved. It is rated T for now, but that might change._

_Just to put this upfront: There will be no Telsen but there will be references to it.. almost happening. You'll see why our lovely Serb didn't take up that offer as things progress._  
><em>Cheers all!<em>

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><p>Prologue<p>

**New Years Eve, 1989**

The last two decades brought him more than a sense of peace. While the game was far from up, the thrill that he was pulling the wool over the eyes of his friends was gone. Perhaps that was because he no longer cared, or maybe because his friends no longer cared. Either way, it had been the most refreshing twenty years of his life. And as the new decade finished out the last of its labor pains, he leaned back in his chair, watching the small television as the countdown began and the shining ball started its decent toward Earth.

Swirling his wine, Nikola's lips pressed together, a small smile attempting to slip out. It felt good to be here. There, in the small sleeping space he used for a bedroom and kept separate from the rest of the lab with a thin amount of plywood and drywall. He had everything he ever wanted.

It was only perfunctory, to keep up the game, that he touched his pen back to the paper to finish composing his letter.

_ …I do hope this letter finds you well as ever and that this new decade is as welcoming to you as I believe mine will be. Perhaps once the Cold War has ended, I will drop by, as it stands, I do not believe the Russians or the CIA will take kindly to me showing my face in public.  
>Happy New Year, Helen.<br>Yours,  
>Nikola<em>

_ P.S. I've finished this at… 12:01 01 January, 1990_

Folding it in thirds, he placed it in the envelope, and sealed it with a quick dab of a sponge. He hated licking those things. Scrawling her name and the address of the Old City Sanctuary across the front, and neglecting to put a return address, he patted it against his palm for a moment before leaning forward to turn off the TV.

Pausing in his seat, a small smile spread across his lips, his eyes flicking to the edge of his vision. It was quite thing to try and describe, and he had only attempted to once. In the end, he'd burned the papers because he felt that it sounded more like the ravings of a lunatic than someone who actually… felt obligated to science to prove it.

Impossible to explain, yet fully tangible, he shook his head a little, the amusement in his eyes as he stood, stretched and began to change for bed. New Years eve was the only time he ever turned in early.

Laying back on the mattress he tucked his hands behind his head. Another decade, and once again, the game continued. If only… he could manage to pull off not sounding like a mad man, or as his usual paranoid self, then perhaps Helen would listen to him. At least he felt no pressure. He was happy, and loved, even if it barely made an ounce of sense to him, and that was with working out the quantitative mathematics for the Super-String model he'd been working.

"Oh well…" sighing softly, he ran a hand through his hair before shutting his eyes, "laku noc."

This decade was sure to be a good one.


	2. Chapter 1

**A/N**: Alrighty! Since I am actually making good on my most recent stab at a vow to actually complete a fanfic (I even have a full plot/story worked out!) I am going to updating every _two_ weeks. Three this time, because I have finals on the week of the 16 and I want to pass my classes, XD.  
>As for the story itself, reviews, as always, are deeply appreciated. Also, I am planning on having this be more "original" Tesla driven, instead of the Sanctuary version. So while I know we all love our arrogant scientist, I find him to be a bit trying in practical writing when it comes to plot advancement. Beside, to me-who has read a lot about the once living Tesla-his completely holier-than-thou attitude should have a place under it once someone's proven themselves. Helen obviously did.<br>I'm also taking pieces of both SanNik (Sanctuary Tesla) and Tesla's personality that hint at something more than just being a Vampire. You guys shall see!  
>Many, many thanks to <strong>Janieables<strong> for being me Beta!  
>Expect an update sometime around the 23. Happy reading.<p>

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><p>Chapter One<br>**And the Right Hand shakes the Left**

The last time she'd heard hide or hair of Nikola had been almost eighteen years since his last letter. And when he'd shown up to help her with the Cabal, and then Adam, and _then_ with the abnormal resistance which had ended in her moving to Hollow Earth, he had been… not himself. But she couldn't out and out say he was a mess.

Flipping through the pages of the personnel files he had sent her from his position as a consultant in DC—oh the ironies of only a few decades ago when they wanted his head on a platter—she set a handful aside. Those who he felt were, or flat out knew, were abnormals living as regular humans, he had flagged for her, and they had gone right to the top of her list.

"Oh thank you, old friend," glancing up as the Big Guy came in with tea, she gave him a smile.

"New recruits?" he grunted picking up a file and flipping it open. It might as well have been one about Henry.

"Something like that, yes. Nikola is making quite good use of his new position, and I have to admit, I am shocked at all of the personnel they turn away or let go for simply… not quite fitting their mold," she really wondered how they could keep Nikola around some times.

"Ah," grunting in his understanding way, he left Helen with her tea and the stack of papers.

The inventory was re-cataloged, she had Henry working on the routing glitch that was making the sprinkler system in the bathroom spontaneously go off, and she had sifted through the pile of résumé and gotten it down to three candidates she needed to track down and interview. Though, it was the folder that had been on the bottom of the pile that had intrigued her the most.

Pulling it back out and opening it, her eyes swept over line after line after line of black ink. She was almost positive that Nikola had included it by mistake, because his hand writing was on the back flap, that annoying code he used when he was jotting something down to remember for later and was almost impossible to decipher. Beside, the personnel photo was missing as well as the name tag on the outer labeling strip of the manila folder. Which was not only confusing but a little disheartening as well. From what she had been able to make out, though a handful of non-blacked out paragraphs, this was the most promising of all of the recruits.

"What do you mean I am being outsourced! I _am_ the outsource!" snapping into the phone, he broke off his rant for a moment as he was told he could either do it or be fired.

"Fine, fine, I'll be the liaison to them, but… well… yes… I do but when did that become any of your business…" growling as he shifted the phone to his shoulder to pull up his email, he began typing out a quick letter.

The grad student who was his contact within the CIA, and quick as a whip, had been someone he'd been following for years. She'd first showed up on the radar in her Undergrad years at her Polytechnic school. It had been more than impressive that she'd managed to get a paper published on the relations of abstract particles in Quantum Theory to nano engines of molecular chemistry and how the mathematical formulae opened up a whole new door for the field. At first he'd been quite unwilling to believe it something so complex had come from a twenty-two year old, which had started his digging in the first place. Of course her being a woman had been just another reason for him to poke around her academic career and find himself impressed despite his best attempts to not be.

Since then, he'd kept track of her advances whenever papers she'd been included on showed up in the scientific journals he followed. Until she'd dropped off the map after her masters and he'd assumed she'd not gone any further.

Of course it wasn't until he was browsing the MIT alumni research projects that he'd come across one that had been archived as basis for a doctoral thesis. It had stuck him wrong from the get-go because the original paper had come from CalTech. The original thesis—which the project had borrowed more than heavily from—had been by the same young woman. Except it had been far more refined into a full scientific brief, and had not only postulated but also proven that on the nano-scale, his work—yes _his_ work—was not only feasible but also necessary.

Though, apparently, since she had gained access to Nikola's Top Secret research from nearly a century and half ago illegally, the FBI had deemed her punishment to work, probably forever, for the federal government.

Of course getting in contact with someone who not only appreciated his work but had applied it had been a must. And it had probably been the first time in over fifty years he felt like he had a friend. Certainly in the last twenty five.

_Cris,  
>Apparently I am to be the liaison between the FBI and the CIA, and working with your department as well as the IS. Can you pick me up at Langley airport tomorrow evening? I'll text you the time my flight comes in.<br>-Nikola_

Using the purposeful miss-spelling of her first name—it was as close to a nickname as he'd dared to get with her—he tapped the send button before hanging up with his Director.

"Absolutely astonishing," he grumbled to himself as he began to look for a last minute flight.

* * *

><p>It hadn't taken him long to grab a handful of clothes and pack them into his suitcase after he'd closed down the office and printed off his ticket from Kayak. What had been the kicker was standing in line at the airport, and fighting the growl that left him as the TSA agents proceeded to check to make sure he wasn't carrying anything out of code. That was part of the curse of being a Vampire as well as magnetic. He turned the x-ray scan into little more than a fuzzy blur. Of course it wasn't like he was actually trying to let them see him in the buff, which didn't help any.<p>

But after the bristling of his feathers at the scan, he'd made his way to the frequent flyer lounge to have a glass before the flight. It wouldn't take long, New York to DC wasn't more than forty five minutes, but between waiting and the actual travel time, he might as well enjoy a good merlot.

Gaze fixed on the blank, washed out sky, he swirled the wine in his glass. Things had changed so drastically in the last twenty years. People were attached to their headphones and wall outlets instead of with their nose in books, he'd gotten a job for the Feds, Helen had blown up her pride and joy, and major super powers had managed to avoid a World War III, while launching themselves into a stalemate economically. And personally?

Nikola snorted, taking a long sip of wine, not bothering to appreciate the taste.

Personally it had been the most hellish years of his life. Things had crumbled so badly by nineteen-ninety-two that he began questioning his sanity as much as everyone else had. Everything he understood about himself and the world in general had been yanked forcibly from underneath him.

Standing as the flight was called and downing the rest of his wine to leave the glass on the table, he maked his way to the platform to milled along with the other passengers before being led to the dock. Finding his seat and pulling out his phone he shot a quick text to his ride.

Chris was indeed an odd duck.

She was one of the only women aside from Helen, he could even dream of respecting, and that was simply because she had accomplished so much and had fought so passionately in her short and young life. Her scientific defense of his theories from long ago made him more than nostalgic, though he wished he'd had someone like her next to him then. When things were less complicated.

Of course, she'd been cleared to know who he _really_ was, which while it shocked her when they'd met, she'd remarked that she was glad she knew the truth. Because otherwise she always would have suspected he was actually... himself.

Opening the window slide to watch the plane taxi out, he shot a glare at his seat mate. The scrawny man next to him looked for all the world like an even more looser version of Henry.

"Just to be upfront about this: we are neighbors for a less than an hour flight, we are not friends, nor will we be," tone clipped, closing the matter as soon as he'd started it, Nikola let his gaze return to the window.

Everything still felt off. Even after all of those years. Though a part of him was positive he'd finally broken free of the emotional break down he'd suffered more than a century ago. Though, if he _was_ free, why was it so damn miserable and lonely? Why had it been then? And why had every day sense felt like he'd tried to lobotomize himself?

And hell, it had felt so undeniably real. As real as being a Vampire, or the wine he favored.

It was one judgment call he couldn't make, and a theory he couldn't prove. Not to mention going to anyone he knew about it was out of the question. Before the sixties they _would_ have locked him up, and after no one would have listened. It was no secret amongst those who knew him that he'd fallen prey to the same belief that others had. That one could expand their mind through the use of acid and various other stimuli.

Lips pursing as he steepled his fingers, a soft sigh escaped him as he felt his ears adjust to the pressure change.

_I do miss her._

* * *

><p>The flight had been pleasant enough, with him wallowing around in self pity for the last two decades of confusion and misery, and he'd bee-lined right to the baggage claim.<p>

Blue eyes scanning the crowd of people picking other people up as he snared the exit, Nikola slowed to make sure he didn't miss anyone. Smile appearing half a second before he caught sight of the shock of long blond hair-let down to her waist since she wasn't confined to the lab-he made his way over to the young woman.

"You couldn't resist, could you?" he asked as he appeared behind her; shaking his head with a soft laugh as he tapped her on the shoulder.

She had spelled his cover name not only fully, but in Cyrillic.

"Nikola!" she jumped, though it was more from the tap.

He knew she knew he'd been coming her way for a while. The woman had more than a sixth sense about things.

"'Course not," and they exchanged a quick hug.

It was something he knew spoke to the depth of their friendship and the trust level. Neither of them were touchy-feely people, generally liking to keep several large feet of space between them and whomever else the were around, but they allowed a few of those rules to be violated by each other.

Offering her his arm as she tucked the paper away into her pocket, he glanced down at her.

After being friends with Helen for so long, it was hard to get used to a woman who not only never wore heels, but was only five one.

"Shall we?" he asked, taking her nod as yes.

"So how was the flight, Nikola?" she asked as they left the landing and headed through the parking garage still arm in arm.

"It was forty five minutes of time not particularly well spent. I worked out a few final touches in my head for a motor I'd been toying with, and reflected a bit on life. Flying does that to me," he replied.

It was nice not having to always be sure to rub someone's nose into how much smarter he was than they were. Chris never submitted one way or another.

"And you, _cheri_?"

"The drive? It was fast, but I somehow think getting back will be slow-rush hour and all," she knew he had booked a handful of nights in a hotel to sort out what sort of job it would look like he would be doing.

"I'm sure we could find something to talk about during the traffic. You're the blue Lincoln?" he asked for confirmation before stopping in front of it as she unlocked the doors.

"Yep."


End file.
